Pantropical tree rings show small effects of drought on stem growth

Pieter A. Zuidema*, Peter Groenendijk, Mizanur Rahman, Valerie Trouet, Abrham Abiyu, Rodolfo Acuña-Soto, Eduardo Adenesky-Filho, Raquel Alfaro-Sánchez, Claudio Roberto Anholetto, José Roberto Vieira Aragão, Gabriel Assis-Pereira, Claudia C. Astudillo-Sánchez, Ana Carolina Barbosa, Giovanna Battipaglia, Hans Beeckman, Paulo Cesar Botosso, Nils Bourland, Achim Bräuning, Roel Brienen, Matthew BrookhouseSupaporn Buajan, Brendan M. Buckley, J. Julio Camarero, Artemio Carrillo-Parra, Gregório Ceccantini, Librado R. Centeno-Erguera, Julián Cerano-Paredes, Rosalinda Cervantes-Martínez, Wirong Chanthorn, Ya Jun Chen, Bruno Barçante Ladvocat Cintra, Eladio Heriberto Cornejo-Oviedo, Otoniel Cortés-Cortés, Clayane Matos Costa, Camille Couralet, Doris Bianca Crispín-De-La-Cruz, Rosanne D'arrigo, Diego A. David, Maaike De Ridder, Jorge Ignacio Del Valle, Mário Dobner, Jean Louis Doucet, Oliver Dünisch, Brian J. Enquist, Karin Esemann-Quadros, Gerardo Esquivel-Arriaga, Ze Xin Fan, Adeline Fayolle, Patrick M. Finnegan, Ingo Heinrich

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

8 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Increasing drought pressure under anthropogenic climate change may jeopardize the potential of tropical forests to capture carbon in woody biomass and act as a long-term carbon dioxide sink. To evaluate this risk, we assessed drought impacts in 483 tree-ring chronologies from across the tropics and found an overall modest stem growth decline (2.5% with a 95% confidence interval of 2.2 to 2.7%) during the 10% driest years since 1930. Stem growth declines exceeded 10% in 25% of cases and were larger at hotter and drier sites and for gymnosperms compared with angiosperms. Growth declines generally did not outlast drought years and were partially mitigated by growth stimulation in wet years. Thus, pantropical forest carbon sequestration through stem growth has hitherto shown drought resilience that may, however, diminish under future climate change.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)532-538
Number of pages7
JournalScience
Volume389
Issue number6759
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 31 Jul 2025

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